Subway sets an all-time Sunday record on Marathon Day as Halloween week becomes the busiest since the pandemic

Halloween on a Saturday and the 50th running of the five-borough New York City Marathon added up to the subway's busiest stretch since the pandemic, with one record that goes back further than that. On Marathon Sunday, Nov. 1, the subway carried 3.14 million riders, the most on any Sunday in recorded MTA history, the MTA and Gov. Kathy Hochul announced.

The records

• Thursday, Oct. 29: 4.72 million riders, the highest single day since the pandemic and 9.7% above the same day last year.
• Friday, Oct. 30: 4.51 million, a post-pandemic Friday record, topping 4.4 million on Oct. 31, 2025.
• Saturday, Oct. 31 (Halloween): 3.59 million, beating the post-pandemic Saturday record of 3.27 million set on May 16 and the most on a Saturday since 2016.
• Sunday, Nov. 1 (Marathon Day): 3.14 million, an all-time Sunday record, 11% above last year's 2.81 million and 109% of pre-pandemic Sunday ridership.
• Friday through Sunday: 11.24 million, a post-pandemic weekend record and 8.4% more than the same weekend last year.
• Week of Oct. 26: 22.62 million riders Monday through Friday and 29.35 million over seven days, both post-pandemic records. Those beat records set just a week earlier, Oct. 19 to 23.

Gothamist, which reported the numbers Tuesday, said the subway's seven-day rolling average reached 4.19 million riders a day last week, its best since the pandemic, according to MTA data. (Gothamist's story gave 3.27 million for Halloween, which is the previous record; the MTA's figure for Oct. 31 is 3.59 million.)

What it took

NYC Transit ran extra service all weekend and put more staff at stations near the marathon finish and other busy viewing spots, the MTA said. Social media videos on Halloween showed huge crowds at the West 4th Street station before the Village Halloween Parade, Gothamist reported.

"From the streets to the subways, New Yorkers were on the move this weekend in record numbers," Hochul said. MTA Chair and CEO Janno Lieber said the numbers show "when New York goes big, it goes by mass transit."

Why it matters

The numbers highlight the subway's continuing recovery from pandemic lows, Gothamist noted. Danny Pearlstein of the Riders Alliance told Gothamist the numbers show the subway is still the "bedrock that connects New Yorkers" and that continued investment is needed to keep up with it. The MTA's five-year capital plan pays for new subway cars, rebuilt train yards and modern signals, and the agency is building the Second Avenue Subway extension into East Harlem, Gothamist noted.